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On your first trip to China, be prepared for a totally fascinating but different culture. And be warned, they will be equally fascinated by you. I like to think that I'm a pretty normal kind of guy and fit into society nicely. I was not prepared to be stared at in the way that I was. I soon learned that it was fascination by the Chinese seeing round blue eyes. I'm sure their fascination will fade as more and more round blue eyes appear in their country.

When you decide to go, the first thing to do is contact the Chinese Embassy or visit their website to get the appropriate forms for your visa. This will give you all the information you will need of what to bring with you to the Embassy when applying for your visa, and the costs.

My wife and I had to go to London (England) for our visas. Get there early and be prepared for a long wait. They will take your passports and then mail them to you in due course. It's scary leaving your passport in the hands of communists, but that is the norm and we had no trouble. They have a pretty no nonsense approach at the embassy in London so don't expect any chit chat. They did bark at us like drill instructors.

You cannot buy Chinese Yuan, or RMB as the Chinese refer to it, currency outside of China. So be prepared to change up some currency at the airport. The current exchange rate is
14 Yuan to the British pound or 7 to the U.S. dollar. That hasn't changed much over the past few years and is unlikely to have any dramatic changes as the Chinese government controls the rate of exchange. Three years ago, it was 15 and 8, respectively. So you needn't shop around for the best rate of exchange. It is the same everywhere.

I was a bit nervous going through customs and immigration. Not because I have criminal tendencies - but because I had never been to a communist country before. It was uneventful. The officer looked at my, and my wife's passports and visas, stamped it and we were away without a word spoken. We cashed up about 50 pounds at the airport and then outside to catch a taxi.

One should always try to travel around China with your destination written in Chinese characters. Believe me, you will find very little English spoken. The concierge at the hotel will be your best bet. Tell him where you want to go, have him write it out in Chinese characters, and then you can show it to the taxi driver. We always carried a card with the name of the hotel with us in Chinese just so we could always hop in a taxi and show the card to the driver.

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