Warmth

Don't look now folks, but it actually breached 40 degrees here in Beijing today.  This was quite a pleasant surprise for me, as I've grown quite tired of waking up and freezing my cheeks off walking to the bathroom.  This was helped by the fact that I am a college age male, so I didn't walk outside until about 1:30 (I woke up at about 9:30, for the record).  I actually opened my window because it was so nice.  If you think I'm going on and on about this, you're right, I am.  The air was relatively good as well.  It was like Christmas.

In addition to the good weather, I've also been compiling some observations from my experience so far, mostly from walking to and from the gym.

• Traffic here is ridiculous.  This doesn't just mean that there's a lot of cars, it means that some people are out of their minds.  Beeping, for example, seem to be compulsory.  No matter the situation, the horn will be pressed.  Two people talking in the street?  Beep.  A car stops to let someone out?  Beep.  Traffic stopped for more than 10 seconds?  Beep.  Beep.  Beep.  This results in several things, most importantly that nobody seems to care about beeping.  You'd think it was birds singing or something.  The concept of pedestrians having the right of way is also unknown in Beijing.  Those the light that indicates its OK to walk across the street is really more of a "hey, try walking, but that taxi driver over there doesn't really care what I say" light.
• It was inevitable, I know, but it's still slightly disconcerting for people to stare at you like you're the Michelin Man.  This is especially true of older people.  The other day, I left the gym with just a shirt on, because I was a little hot from running.  This caused about four older people to stare very intensely at me.  You can imagine they were even more surprised when I said hello in Chinese.
• Spit, oh how I hate it.  Unfortunately, I appear to be in the spitting capital of the world.  Walking through the street is like a game of "dodge the loogie."  At some point you have to stop caring and just accept that you're going to step in some.  This is a combination of cultural and environmental factors.  Spitting just isn't considered rude here.  More importantly, the air pollution cannot be helping people's respiratory and sinus health.  I have had a mild cough since I got here, and I find myself spitting on occasion.  I don't spit in the middle of the sidewalk, however.