Travelositive [old]

 "Let me take a photo of you!" told me one guy while I was admiring the Forbidden City from the top of the hill in Jingshan Park... in this way I got my tourist photo.  My video featuring Tiananmen area, Jingshan park and a bit of couchsurfing in Beijing. The whole area around the Forbidden City is amazing, too many places, beautiful parks and things to see. I've heard you can have a good view from Jingshan, the park north of the City so I headed that way. One of the corner towers while going around the moat surrounding the Forbidden City. Jingshan park has a mere entrance of  元2 (totally worth it), as soon as I got in my ears caught the sound of some traditional organ. This guy was busking, nice music and big smile.  Going up the artificial hill of the park named "Prospect Hill". Im expecting some nice views on the top.  View of the park facing towards Di'anmen inner street. Jingshan  is an imperial park covering 23 hectares...

Tiananmen square is supposed to be one of the biggest in the world, and believe me, it definitely is! Its very hard to get the whole place in one photograph, unless you are flying a drone. Its one of the best places for people watching. Families with their kids playing, eating snacks, couples, so many people enjoying their time! The square contains the Monument to the People's Heroes, the Great Hall of the People, the National Museum of China, and the Mausoleum of Mao Zedong.It has great cultural significance as it was the site of several important events in Chinese history. It was the first time I had my passport and things checked in order to visit a square. The security was very tight, I am sure many of the "locals" around were police in civilian clothes and security cameras in every place possible. At some point I saw a big crowd and found out there was some kind of military parade. Everybody was taking photos and videos and I too the opportunity to snap...

...it was a beautiful garden with almost no people so I decided to sit down for a bit and enjoy... Touched down in Beijing airport, immigration this time was extremely fast and straight forward, no questions at all, just a photo and an entry stamp. Customs even better, nobody there to ask anything, just go through the "nothing to declare gate". The bus to the city costed just  元 16 (€1,72 based to the exchange rate back then).  Later on, in the metro, 元 2 (€0.21) ticket, there was an x-ray check and the girl was concerned about my shaving foam. No sprays allowed and my foam looked like a spray, I thought it was about my stuff or tripod being mistaken as a weapon... I take it out of the bag and she takes it to examine. Smiling, I take it back and put some foam on my hand making gestures that this is for shaving. She understood and nodded  that it was alright. Beijing metro is clean, efficient and really nice. All in English as well, pretty crowded but...