I slept a lot of the way so I did miss most of the scenery. However, the sunrise was phenomenal. We had made a rest stop when we got to the outskirts of Beijing where I woke up. When we got back onto the highway we were driving incredibly slow...then we pulled over and I could tell the driver wasn't entirely sure where to go and was trying to follow the GPS. We went a few hundred yards driving slow again past an exit, which happened to be our exit. We pull over again and began REVERSING down the highway. Driving is a bit of a free for all here; at least in the eyes of a foreigner. To be honest, I've seen less accidents here than in Chicago in a few days time, even among what appears to be chaos it works well. I know there is a stereotype of the Chinese being bad drivers, however, I actually think it takes more skill to drive the way they do here than the way we do in the US and have it work in such harmony. Everyone seems to be aware and looking out for the other drivers and pedestrians instead of just looking out for themselves.
We finally arrived at the place for the health check and I filled out the form...3 times because I kept filling things out incorrectly. I went up and paid for my exam and was handed a sheet of paper that had my picture on the front and my patient information along with a bunch of bar code stickers. That's it. No direction besides "go to each of the rooms listed below". There was a list of 7 medical tests you must complete from blood pressure to eye exam to ECG to x-ray to blood test, etc. The whole gamut. I was told this would all only take 45 minutes. I couldn't figure out how. It kind of felt like a scavenger hunt. I walked through the listed rooms where a doctor was sitting, they would take my paper, perform a task, stamp my paper and take the bar code and say "done". And, off to the next room I would go. Most of them seemed totally normal, the eye exam was the only one that left me scratching my head. I stood behind the line and the doctor pointed to an eye chart at 3 varying sizes of font. However, every single letter he pointed to was M. So, he was either taking it easy on me or I totally failed the test.
We went for a wonderful sushi lunch and then sat outside at a Starbucks until our ride could meet us. One of the Chinese teachers came and met me to ride back with me to Datong. We arrived back home around 10:30 PM and went for a quick BBQ dinner. It was amazing...there were a few things that were a little strange and a few things I didn't know what they were but all amazing nonetheless.
Food here is quite cheap. For our BBQ dinner we got the following (that I know) for 198 rmb which equals about $33 for 4 people.
Marinated cucumber
Steamed peanuts
Pig skin on a stick
Tube of cows heart on a stick
Steamed bread on a stick
Potato (I think) on a stick
Lettuce rolled in something on a stick
Chicken on a stick
Beef on a stick
Clams with noodles and sauce
4 beers