Yesterday was a highlight of my stay in Beijing. I spent the entire afternoon exploring Beihai park in the central part of Beijing, with a newfound almost-friend, Jingyao. And then we had the evening together walking the city, having a hot-pot dinner and taking the Metro.

The first story is about “How did you meet Jingyao?” About two weeks ago, I was in one of the dining halls for dinner and I decided that I wanted to have soup, at the make-your-own-soup station. I didn’t quite know how it worked, so I asked the woman next to me: “Do you speak English?” And she said, “Yes!” and then proceeded to show me the process of getting my own soup. The station looks a bit like the open dairy cases at Wegman’s — it’s an open refrigerated case, and it has all kinds of uncooked vegetables, pasta noodles and meats. The way it works is that you take a shoebox-sized plastic basket and you choose all the ingredients that you would like in your soup. You place the items in the basket and then bring the basket of ingredients to the soup counter. The cooks take your basket and add boiling hot broth and cook everything together for about 5 minutes. When it’s ready, you pick it up at the counter and add yummy things like green onions, cilantro, boiled peanuts and red chili pepper mix and it’s ready to eat.

I invited her to join me for dinner. We had a wonderful conversation. She was lively, confident and had very good English. She asked me if I like visiting parks and when I said yes she started ticking off the names of the parks I should visit. I was having trouble keeping up with her suggestions, so I handed her my phone, and she dropped a whole bunch of pins on my Google map showing all the best parks. Then, when she found out I liked art galleries, she did the same for those. It was a great dinner and so we exchanged contact info and said we should have dinner together again.

A week ago, she sent me a message and asked if I’d like to go sightseeing. She said she’d be my guide!

So yesterday we headed out, via the Metro subway, to the Beihai park. Interesting impressions were that: 1) the Metro is very clean and very quiet; 2) every station has a metal detector with a conveyor belt, just like airport security back in the States! 3) since I am a foreigner, I can’t use the self-service ticket-buying machines. I have to talk to a person at the ticket kiosk and buy my tickets individually, one by one every time. This system is not set up for foreign tourists; 4) to buy tickets into the park, I had to bring and show my passport. Every person entering the park had to show their ID! You can’t just pay money to get in. They need to know who you are, as well. The Chinese have to scan in their ID’s to buy tickets and get into the park. I could comment here, but I won’t.

About 10 minutes into my trip with Jingyao, we have this conversation:

• Me: So you’re a graduate student, right? What are you studying?
• Her: (frowning) I’m not a graduate student. I’m just a junior.
• Me: Oh, really? I just figured you were older because you seem older. And you speak with confidence, more than you’d expect of a person your age. I’m thinking: omg, not only did I arrange a half-day outing with a brand-new acquaintance, but this acquaintance is just 20 years old! Yikes. I hope this goes well.

After the Metro ride, our first stop is her favorite cafe. Trying to be hip, I order a coffee drink: oat milk latte on ice. This is about the third time in my entire life that I have had coffee. I actually liked it. We got a slice of pistachio cheesecake to finish and that was delicious too.

It felt like the Gimme Coffee on North Cayuga Street and it reminded me of all the cafe-sitting I have done with my Israeli friend, Ornit.

We walked a couple of miles more and saw some beautiful architecture, temples and museum buildings.

Our destination for the day was Beihai Park, which was first built in 1166. A description of the park said that it is the oldest and best-preserved imperial garden in the world.

There were so many parts of the park that were enjoyable: long tree-lined avenues for pedestrians to walk along, temples hidden in the hillsides, ponds, a huge beautiful lake and a grand temple and temple gate. Although there were thousands of people there, it did not feel overwhelming. The path goes all the way around an enormous lake, more than 3 miles around!

We had some interesting conversations that afternoon. I asked lots of questions about her life, and life as a young person in China. We talked about her plans to come to the States for one or two years for a Master’s Degree in Communication and how life would feel different stateside. At one point we had this conversation:

• Me: Do you have a boyfriend?
• Her: No!
• Me: (hmmm, that was a very strong no…) A girlfriend?..
• Her: (smiling) Yes! Well actually, no. I had a girlfriend my senior year in high school and my first year of college. But we broke up. She’s a director. That’s my type, can’t you tell?
• Me: A play director?
• Her: Yup
• Me: Nice!

From there, we had an interesting discussion of gay rights, and Chinese society’s acceptance (or lack thereof) of gays.

From one of the Temples there were some excellent views of the city of Beijing, as well as the mountains to the north. The city of Beijing is quite large. In early May, I was trying to get a perspective on what it would be like in Beijing. I had thought that Beijing would have a population comparable to New York City. But then…. I looked it up. Beijing has 3x as many people as NYC! Beijing has about the same number of people as live in all of New York State! Beijing has 20 million people, and they all live within a 10-mile radius of downtown. There are tall apartment buildings and skyscrapers everywhere. It’s very densely populated. In one of the photos below you can see the buildings of the skyline. What was surprising to me was that it didn’t feel like a huge city, right then right there. You would never have guessed that we were almost at the center of an enormous, bustling city.

I really enjoyed Jingyao’s company throughout the day. She was talkative and an easy conversationalist. At one point, I was talking about my passport photo….

• Me: Here’s my passport photo. When they took the picture at the passport photo store, they told me I couldn’t smile.
• Her: Ahhh, but I can see a hint of a smile there. You are actually smiling, just a little bit.
• Me: Yeah, you noticed! I think the no-smiling rule is a dumb rule. So I smiled as much as I thought I could get away with. I was in a defy-the-government kind-of mood.
• Her: I’m impressed.
• Me: But still, it’s not a great passport photo — at the passport store, the main light source was a spotlight coming straight down from above my head. It made my gray hair glow bright white. Very unflattering.
• Her: So, what color was your hair before it went gray?
• Me: (My thought: What?! Has my hair turned so gray that she can’t even see that my hair is brown?! This is bad, very bad. I hate getting old. Ugggh.) Brown. My hair was brown.

We walked all the way around the lake. It was more than 4 miles, and lovely the whole way. As we walked, we talked more.

• Me: I have to tell you… I am a huge women’s soccer fan.
• Her: (she stops walking and looks at me stunned) No way. So am I. And I watch the men’s game too. Tonight it’s the Finals of the FA Cup, Man City versus Man United. First time in 150 years. Aren’t Haaland and De Bruyne amazing together?
• Me: I cannot believe I am having this conversation. I come all the way from the US to China, and I run into a woman who knows and loves soccer! This is seriously cool. Erling Haaland is amazing. He keeps getting perfect passes from Kevin De Bruyne and he puts them away every time. They are a perfect combo. You’re rooting for Man City, right?
• Her: Of course! I have a bunch of friends who are part of the local soccer scene on amateur teams. They have reserved an Irish pub to watch the game tonight. It’s going to be a really good game.

We talked a bunch more about soccer, and then had a delicious dinner of traditional Beijing hot pot. No weird stuff this time.

It was a really wonderful day. I was super-impressed with the lake and city park. It was incredibly restful and rejuvenating to be outside enjoying the sunshine and surroundings. I made a new friend and we walked more than 10 miles together!

I am looking forward to a good week, with occasional outings on a bike share bike. I’ll keep you posted. I’m thinking of you all! — Melissa

Topics for upcoming posts: teaching statistics to Chinese students in a Chinese classroom, riding a bike in Beijing city traffic, the local weather (100 degrees forecasted for next week), and more weird food stories.