China is not only the fastest growing economy or a rapidly changing society, but is also an interesting tourist destination. Recently I spent a few days in China where I went to attend a conference in Beijing. Because of the olympics coming up next year, the whole city is under construction. You get to see a lot of traditional monuments like the forbidden city and summer palace in midst of cranes busy in building modern skyscrapers.

After Beijing I went to Shanghai, a whole different world made entirely of flashing neon lights. Every free bit of space in the city is used for advertisements. Big malls selling exclusively french and italian designer articles can be found at every intersection. The city has more McDonalds then the rest of the world combined. And the only other restaurant one can find is Pizza Hut. All I can say more about Shanghai is: go see it for yourself.

The only language people of China know is Mandarin which coincidently is one of the many languages I don't know. When in Shanghai, we felt adventurous decided to go to Tongli, a small village nearby. Reaching Tongli required us to first take a train to Suzhou and then take a bus from there. As it can be imagined, reaching there without getting lost is an achivement in itself. But the trip was worth it, both for Tongli and adventure involved.

China is completely different from what I expected it to be. There is no visible trace of communism. Everything is under construction. Overall, it was a great trip!