July 13: Beijing

I’m in Beijing. I arrived last night right in the middle of rush hour. I was picked up by Jack and Nancy. Nancy has been employed by Sino for one month. She’s a recent university graduate of some technology school. I couldn’t catch 20% of what she said. Phonetically, Chinese is one of the hardest language I've encountered. Usually when people speak in another language, the letters appear in front of me and this time it didn’t.

Jack is a young man from Inner Mongolia. I don’t think he has hit his 20s. He’s thin. He maneuvered in traffic with precision and confidence. There was only one time that he slammed on the break so that we wouldn’t hit the car in front of us. I was impressed because driving in the second ring road required nerve of steel. Cars and pedestrian competed for space on the road. I tried tipping Jack when we arrived at the gated compound. He brushed away my wrist. I was impressed by the strength of this skinny young man. As he pushed my hand away he said, “No, no, no.” He continued to say this and Nancy joined him in saying, “It’s our pleasure.”
We were greeted by Ms Wu at the apartment. She showed me the place. It’s nice. Fully furnished and clean. The apartment is western style.