Above:The Baha'i House of Worship of Asia. Below:Life and times of your fellow World Citizen, Kolya

I spent my last day in Beijing (BJ) by going to a Thai/Indian Restaurant for lunch and then the visa office. It seemed that little had been done to further the Indian visa but since it was the third day and I had sat down without planning to leave until it was finished it was sent for processing and was finished within half an hour. Also as a U.S. Citizen there are no more formalities than filling out the form and paying the fee. While Chinese citizens, on the other hand, also need some kind of letter of introduction or purpose and the Air-ticket or something. It was cutting it a bit close, and a bit stressful, but in the end 3 days WAS enough, as it had been in the past. I wasn’t able to get to BJ any sooner anyway. Regardless, I got my visa around 16:30 and then bought some mouthwash at the BJ Friendship Store, which is not available in Baotou (at least not Listerine or Colgate brands--although actually I was hoping for Cinnamony Lavoris or whatever the brand is).

Then I took the Metro and bus back to Felix’s house (a German friend with whom I’d been staying) and after dinner at a Xinjiang/Uyghur restaurant took a taxi to the airport. There, I bought my ticket for BJ to Baotou, which I’ll need on my return from India (on the 14th of February). Someone came up and helped me a bit with that but wanted a tip for his help!

Unfortunately, the flight was delayed… postponed from 23:50 to 08:30 due to morning fog in Delhi, which happens fairly often at this time of year. So they drove us all to a Hotel near the airport, which was fine, I probably got a bit more sleep that way than I would have otherwise. There was a delegation of Mongolian Buddhists, 2 of them senior monks, or Abbots, perhaps, and one young monk. I got to talking to the young monk. We were on the same bus to the hotel. I was hoping he’d sit next to me, but when he didn’t I got up and sat next to him. When he heard that I live in Inner Mongolia he gave me his card and invited my to visit his monastery, the next time I’m in Ulaanbaatar. Despite his youth, he’s apparently Chief of the Foreign Affairs Dept. And his name’s Lhagvademchig, or Demchig, for short. He told me he had lived a number of years in India in Varenasai and in Delhi also, and now their delegation was going to Veranaserai (or however it’s spelt) because they were going to build a Stupa or Temple or something—I don’t remember exactly. I presume the rest of the Mongolians (in “civilian” clothes) were investors for the project, or something.

The other interesting thing that happened was that, in the Airport, while I was on the way to my gate I met Amica, a Baha’i friend from Inner Mongolia (Hohhot). She was leaving China for the near future, going back to Australia, to get a degree in Economics of Development, or something like that. What Synchronicity! Or Providence, or whatever you like to call it! Also she had some munchies and juice which I was very happy to partake in, THANKS, Amica! (BTW, I generally prefer to call it Providence.)

The flight didn’t actually leave until about 9:00 but otherwise from there everything ran very smoothly and for the first time there wasn’t a horde of people at the Immigration counter and I actually got to the Luggage belt BEFORE some unknown person had taken them all off, as was y\usually the case in the past. A quick money exchange and pre-paid taxi trip later and I was home again! My parent’s home, in Delhi, as opposed to my home in China!