Tianjin China: Part of the bathroom in my room in the Tianjin Radisson Blu Hotel where I stayed most of the time while in the city.

Tianjin China: Part of the bathroom in my room in the Tianjin Radisson Blu Hotel where I stayed most of the time while in the city.

Tianjin China: Part of the bathroom in my room in the Tianjin Radisson Blu Hotel where I stayed most of the time while in the city.

Tianjin China: Part of the bathroom in my room in the Tianjin Radisson Blu Hotel where I stayed most of the time while in the city.

Tianjin China: Boat moored along the containment wall of the Tianjin Haihe River.

Tianjin China: Second World War memorial monument.

Tianjin China: Two girls take advantage of the background temple along the Ancient Culture Street to snap some "selfies" using one of the handheld monopods with handle shutter button.

Tianjin China: Tourists meander along the wide Ancient Culture Street.

Tianjin China: At either side of the door into a temple along the Ancient Culture Street these fierce creatures stand watch... and provide photo opportunities for tourists.

Tianjin China: Entrance to one of several temple seen along the wide Ancient Culture Street.

Tianjin China: Tourists meander along the wide Ancient Culture Street. "Beach" umbrellas provide shade for vendors and are seen everywhere.

Tianjin China: Looking down one of the side alleyways off the Ancient Culture Street.

Tianjin China: Tourists stroll the main way through the Ancient Culture Street. During my half hour exploration I saw not a single other Westerner and became a main attraction for a half dozen Chinese tourists... who obviously found me an oddity and requested that I pose for photos.

Tianjin China: At another temple along the Ancient Culture Street I found this charming guy with the big smile.

Tianjin China: Tables full of local handicrafts like this one may be seen along the wide Ancient Culture Street.

Tianjin China: Tables full of local handicrafts like this one may be seen along the wide Ancient Culture Street.

Tianjin China: Tables full of local handicrafts like this one may be seen along the wide Ancient Culture Street.

Tianjin China: Eye of Tianjin looms over the Yongle Bridge as I approach the end of my Haihe River walk one day.  Slowly revolving only twice as fast as the minute hand of a clock, it appears stationary during short periods of observation. Cost for the half hour ride is 70RMB or about $11.50.
 

Tianjin China: Dental checkup bus parked near the Drum Tower. Notice the sign in the window: "Gratuitous treatment bus."

 

Tianjin China: Drum Tower, view from the north along the tourist shopping street.

 

Tianjin China: Tianjin China: Drum Tower, view from the south along the tourist shopping street.

 

Tianjin China: Drum Tower, view of amber sellers seen on the area around the base from the south side. All the unpolished "stones" are similar in size, about the size and shape of a chicken egg. Polished specimens contained intact, large insects, making me wonder if they might be fake.

 

Tianjin China: Many safety reminder signs like this encourage drivers to obey laws; this one probably cautions people to avoid using the phone while driving.

 

 

 

Greetings from Tianjin

 

After five days in the Beijing Holiday Inn Express and tolerating the cramped room and lobby Internet terminals monopolized by kids playing games, I searched for more appropriate accommodations to sit out the 30 days until my DPRK trip. Finding nothing better in Beijing near the Koryo Tours offices, I searched elsewhere.

 

Tianjin is a city of about fifteen million built around the meandering Haihe River about one hundred and twenty kilometers southeast of Beijing. Known to some as the Water City, information available on the Internet made it look like an interesting place to explore. The high speed "bullet" train makes the trip in about a half hour, arriving at the ultra-modern Tianjin terminal conveniently located with one of the subway stations. The short trip felt like being on an airline... complete with attentive stewardesses selling refreshments; a big bottle of Pepsi set me back one dollar... I expected to pay a lot more.

Not far from the arriving railway terminal I found the five star Radisson Blu Plaza Hotel. Prior experience in Tunisia suggested it would be excellent... if a bit pricey. Without breakfast the walk-in rate is $84... the fabulous buffet breakfast adds another $16. After two nights and a decision to spend much more time in this luxury $100 house I approached May Lu, the reception shift manager to inquire about a better deal for my planned long term stay. Sure enough, she found a 500RMB ($81) including breakfast option for a minimum 10 night stay... which I quickly grabbed.

Internet access in the hotel is generally reliable, but still hampered by the Google - PRC government censorship war... and frequently degraded bandwidth. Limited bandwidth means pages loaded with extravagant advertising features come up very slowly! With Gmail unavailable, I am using Hotmail again while here in China and that seems to be working fairly well.

After much experimentation I finally re-discovered how to use the file transfer utility on my Galaxy Note smart phone and can once again get the photographs over to the laptop for inclusion in new web pages. The Dropbox application is much more convenient as everything is handled automatically, but until I leave China this other tactic will work nicely.

As I had previously signed up for Microsoft's automatic free Windows 10 upgrade, my Asus T100 Windows 8 became the new version on 11 August and proceeded without any complications, taking less than an hour. Only miner relearning has been required and that mostly obvious from the new logical screen layouts. A problem with the Asus touchpad corrected itself transparently, making touch typing now problem free.

On one of my first walks around Tianjin I found a small shopping complex containing a Wal-Mart! Many small homegrown, copycat fast food restaurants are found in the vicinity, including one called Yankee King. Cookie cutter high-rise apartment structures dominate the architectural scene, but there are many different basic floor plan designs.

I'll continue vegetating here in Tianjin until time to return to Beijing for the DPRK trip. I like what I've seen so far and there are many interesting areas to explore on foot with convenient bus and subway access to all parts of the city. There are so many bus routes crisscrossing the city it is hard to keep track of them all.

The day before my first night in the city I walked 16,000 steps looking for the southern Beijing high-speed railway station with trains for Tianjin ... so much tramping while carrying a heavy backpack ended with sore shoulders from the straps digging in plus both feet screaming, but no new blisters.

The acoustic ambiance in the city is unique. Gone are all the noisy motorcycles and TukTuks; almost everything moving is now battery powered, except the buses and many of those use LNG. Music is almost entirely Western, albeit in Chinese. Vendors personally touting their wares have been replaced by small electronic announcement devices that repeat an advertising message endlessly, and irritatingly!

Smog is terrible in cities all over China including here. A website provides current pollution readings for any location in the world: see the Tianjin Page. Checking the readings for Las Vegas I discovered pollution in my home town is not so bad.

7 August 2015: After twelve totally enjoyable nights in the truly excellent Radisson Blu Hotel I decided to move to a place nearer the central business district. The Golden Crown Hotel is one of the city's other landmarks. Tall and gold, it can be spotted for quite some distance away. More importantly, there are a number of interesting places to explore in the immediate vicinity of this glittering tower, including several shopping malls and Western fast food franchises like KFC and McDonalds.

My immediate impression during the Golden Crown Hotel check-in is that staff have not received enough guest relations training for an international five star hotel. The physical plant itself is perfection... easily worth the assigned five stars. Only a few staff have any English language skills and appear reluctant to use them, making interactions awkward. I met the manager, Mr. Xu Jun during a pre-booking inspection of the hotel and he does have a reasonably good command of English. A young man in his early 30's, this hotel may be taxing his current abilities. With my anticipated two weeks or more stay, he approved a room upgrade to "Deluxe" for the 500RMB (about $81) rate.

My 16th floor room facing south is deluxe in every way; perfect. The comfortable bed is king-size and the lavish bathroom is fit for a king. The separate shower stall is the best I've enjoyed on this current expedition. After that great first night in the room I eagerly anticipated my first buffet breakfast in the tastefully appointed third floor dining room. Immediately, I noticed the appropriately soft background music chosen for diners. However, distracted and inattentive dining room staff made that experience soon feel like being in a bus station cafeteria, albeit with an ample offering of imaginative breakfast dishes including a small selection of local specialties. Coffee is by request only... begging, really. The hotel's Food and Beverage operation needs a serious management review.

Typhoon Soudelor crept up the east coast of China toward Tianjin last week, but changed course before getting anywhere near Tianjin. The devastation where it made landfall looks terrible, so I'm glad it decided to head away from the mainland (over toward South Korea).

FLASH! Just before midnight last night (12 Aug) as I slept, a loud noise woke me in my sixteenth floor Golden Crown Hotel room. Still groggy, I went back to sleep. At 06:00 this morning I finally awoke fully and turned on CNN where breaking news flashed "Tianjin," my present location in China! A reporter using Skype managed to provide several short segments of live video before being forcibly stopped by state security agents jostling him and yelling in Chinese: "No reporters! No reporters!" According to several news reports the authorities have declared Marshall Law in the immediate vicinity of the blasts near the waterfront, quite some distance to the east from the central business district where I'm located. Early reports say hundreds are injured with more than a dozen dead, but press censorship is limiting what news is being made available to the public here in China. Hospitals throughout the city of about fifteen million are all treating the injured. My 16th floor hotel room faces south and looking eastward I can see nothing unusual at 07:00. However, it is a VERY smoggy morning. A day later multiple smoke plumes appeared in the distance to the southeast and news reports of the rising number of dead and injured continued to demonstrate the horrendous dimensions of this disaster.

In thinking about press censorship in the wake of a terrorist attack it occurs to me that because one of the main objectives of terrorism is to focus attention on some perceived wrong the adversary feels powerless to overcome, it almost always achieves that objective. Government censorship denies the terrorist that advantage. The Chinese censorship policies may be more rational than Westerners are willing to concede.

The Rule Of Law is another matter. Way too many people here ignore sensible laws on the streets, making me suspect the culture has evolved a general attitude of "me first" without regard for the rights of others. For example: from my eighteenth floor hotel room vantage, on several occasions I have witnessed emergency vehicles, sirens blearing, inching foreward as they approach an intersection while drivers fail to yield the right of way! Or, consider the subway situation where car doors have signs to manage the entry and exit rush, but people waiting to get on the cars commonly push into the wall of passengers waiting to get off, knocking them aside aggressively in their thoughtless determination to find an unoccupied seat inside. The Ugly American of the previous century has become the Ugly Chinese.

How did Chinese adults learn to be so thoughtless? I now recall the boisterous, unruly, swaggering behavior of children running around the dining-rooms in all three of the deluxe hotels I've used in Beijing and here. Frequently, kids treat the five star hotel environs like an outdoors playground; mindlessly bumping into tables and shouting at their playmates, seemingly oblivious of the adult diners trying to enjoy a peaceful breakfast. Is it possible the current Chinese culture fostered by the Communist Party has encouraged parents to teach their children: "Might makes right?" If so, what does this bode for the future of a Chinese superpower looming on the horizon?

While exploring the CBD area I found the Tianjin People's Park and took a stroll around the inner perimeter. Making the exotic experience even more memorable, I stumbled on a group of four old guys in tank tops and shorts making music with their two string Erhu fiddle-like instruments while another of their group wailed away in that strange voice associated with ancient, traditional Chinese folk music. People's Park contains a collection of small gardens mingled among the islands in a man-made lake; quite lovely, as the many photos displayed on this page confirm.

My Caucasian features still attract constant attention on the street, especially from children. A handful of encounters with other elderly bystanders has led to "conversations" about age. The Chinese use a unique set of finger gestures to denote numbers. My eight fingers followed by one has created confusion and then a flurry of finger responses from Chinese guys. Finally, I checked to see what their hand talk meant; actually pretty logical once you get the hang of it. Speaking of gestures, I've discovered how to use my fishtailing palm to indicate I'd like a fish dish in restaurants. I always get a seafood... with smiles all around. Selecting items from the overhead menu display in fast food restaurants is a problem as the people behind the counter have a hard time telling exactly where I am pointing... especially when the display contains a several items spaced close together. It occurred to me a laser pointer would solve the problem nicely... but I left mine at home this trip.

22 August: Back to Beijing for a few days before the North Korea trip starts on the 25th. I returned from Tianjin to start the DPRK tour preparation the next day, with the flight scheduled for  25 August into the DPRK. I prebooked one night in the Riverview Hotel near the Koryo Tour offices based on glowing descriptions found on the Internet. Unfortunately, this house did not come anywhere close to matching the quality I expected from the Agoda description. The "river view" actually is a block of aging apartment buildings and the stained carpets badly need cleaning. The odd TV setup had no English language channels after a convoluted guest setup process and then the inaudible sound could not be adjusted! The plank bed with a thin pad is just what is prescribed for Buddhist monks, so I considered it a mixed blessing. All of the staff I encountered have been more than friendly.

Fortunately, on my first walk I discovered the nearby, recently opened five star BaiFuYi Hotel and negotiated a not unreasonable 600RMB room rate for my next two nights before the DPRK departure on 25 August. This postcard likely will be the last one until I return from my DPRK visit. I do not expect to have Internet access while on that short four night tour.

 

Peace,

 

Fred L. Bellomy

 

Tianjin China: This is the Tianjin Radisson Blu Hotel where I stayed most of the time while in the city. The odd exterior of the building made it easy to find returning on buses or foot.

 

Tianjin China: View of my double-twin king-size bed in the Tianjin Radisson Blu Hotel I used while in the city. Everything in this hotel is tasteful and of high quality.

 

Tianjin China: The blue sign reads: "Tianjin Tourist Information Center" and experience has taught me someone in the center would almost certainly speak good English... or why would they include the English in the sign? So, I approached the woman under the red Chinese sign standing in what appeared to be the entrance door into the information center. With gestures only I enquired where I would find the information center. In Chinese she explained I should check on the other side of the central bus station pavilion, that I would find no information anywhere near the blue sign... say what? I never found the tourist information center!

 

Tianjin China: Not far from the Tianjin Radisson Blu Hotel I used while in the city is a Wal-Mart surrounded by many restaurants including a KFC and the Golden Arches plus a big selection of Chinese versions of their American examples. The name of this one caught my attention because it looked like Yankee King and is, indeed pronounced that way by the Chinese. I had a $4 lunch there which had no resemblance to Yankee foods.

 

Tianjin China: It is smoggy here and on some days so much so one sees many people wearing masks like this one! After a period of respiratory congestion I took the hotel's advice and bought a bundle of masks for myself... but rarely wore them... actually only once.

 

Tianjin China: Entrance to the Tianjin People's Park where I enjoyed a half hour stroll around the lush garden inside perimeter. A man-made lake forms the centerpiece for the park where I watched amateur musicians play their two string "violins" accompanied by a Chinese version of Karaoke. The howling, wailing sound of the song gave the whole scene a very exotic foreign flavor.

 

Tianjin China: Information posted near the entrance to the Tianjin People's Park which I found during one of my walks exploring the areas around the Golden Crown Hotel.
 

Tianjin China: Looking out across the man-made lake which forms the centerpiece in the Tianjin People's Park which I found during one of my walks exploring the areas around the Golden Crown Hotel.

 

Tianjin China: Many little pavilions like this offer people a place to play games or just sit and enjoy the serenity of the park. Dressed for hot weather, these guys are playing Dominoes.

 

Tianjin China: Looking into one of the garden island areas around the man-made lake which forms the centerpiece in the Tianjin People's Park.

 

Tianjin China: Street view of the spectacularly handsome five star Golden Crown Hotel where I stayed for six nights during my time in the city. A unique landmark building at the center of the central business district, it made finding my way back from random walks in the vicinity less difficult in this "forest" of tall buildings.

 

Tianjin China: Beautiful replica of an ancient Chinese seismometer near the reception desk in the lobby of the Golden Crown Hotel where I stayed during the second half of my time in the city. A bronze marble precariously held in the mouth of each dragon falls out when the Earth moves in it's direction, falling into the open mouth of toad directly below. Ingenious! 

 

Tianjin China: View from my sixteenth floor room in the Golden Crown Hotel where I stayed during a portion of my time in the city.

 

Tianjin China: Part of the extensive Tianjin Haihe River walkway. I found it perfect path for long walks. Fishermen catch a lot if their numbers are any indication. At one point a mob of men with poles and nets occupied every spot along a ten meter stretch of the bank. Something in the water seemed to be attracting fish and turtles to that section of the river; I suspect a sewage outlet.

 

Tianjin China: One of the many cruise boats offering trips every few minutes on the Tianjin Haihe River.

 

Tianjin China: Southern entrance to the Ancient Culture Street. For the Chinese it must be like our Olivera Street in Los Angeles is to the Latinos.  Foreign visitors might like the Chinese traditional handicrafts being offered by most shops along the street and down alleyways.

 

Tianjin China: At either side of the door into a temple along the Ancient Culture Street these fierce creatures stand watch... and provide photo opportunities for tourists.

 

Tianjin China: Near a temple along the Ancient Culture Street this beggar takes advantage of the spiritual atmosphere.

 

Tianjin China: Tourists meander along the wide Ancient Culture Street. "Beach" umbrellas provide shade for vendors... and block the view much of the time for visitors.

 

Tianjin China: Tables full of local handicrafts like this one may be seen along the wide Ancient Culture Street.

 

Tianjin China: Northern entrance to the Ancient Culture Street. For the Chinese it must be like our Olivera Street in Los Angeles is to the Latinos: a reminder of times past.

 

Tianjin China: Replicates of ancient Chinese coins embedded in the sidewalk near the northern entrance to the Ancient Culture Street.

 

Tianjin China: One of the northern entrances to the Ancient Culture Street.

 

Tianjin China: Eye of Tianjin looms over the Yongle Bridge as I approach the end of my Haihe River walk one day.  Slowly revolving only twice as fast as the minute hand of a clock, it appears stationary during short periods of observation. Cost of the half hour ride is 70RMB or about $11.50.

 

Tianjin China: Drum Tower, view from the south along the tourist shopping street and next to the giant golden Buddha.

 

Tianjin China: Drum Tower, view from the south along the tourist shopping street.

 

Tianjin China: One vendor's display of things for sale on the south side of the Drum Tower  along the tourist shopping street.

 

Tianjin China: Drum Tower, view of amber sellers seen on the area around the base from the south side. All the unpolished "stones" are similar in size, about the size and shape of a chicken egg. Most polished specimens contained large intact insects, making me wonder if they just might be realistic replicas.

 

Tianjin China: Ongoing escalator maintenance seen in the Joy City shopping mall near the Drum Tower. There has been a great deal of publicity lately about fatal escalator accidents due to faulty maintenance in China leading me to exercise heightened caution when using the conveniences.

 

 

End