TouchBeijing.com

Tianjin is one of the four Municipal cities in China, besides Tianjin, other three are, Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing, but different from others, Tianjin is quite silent for many years. The distance between Beijing and Tianjin is just 150 KM, but not so many local Beijingers would travel to Tianjin, there are many reasons, one of them is the train is slow, takes about 1.5 hours to go, or by the highway, which takes about 2 hours, as the traffic is not very good sometimes.

Until recently (just before the Game) a high-speed train system is built-up and links tightly Tianjian and Beijing. Now this high-speed train takes only 30 minutes, and departs every 15 minutes from both Beijing and Tianjin, from 06:15 (from Beijing) to 22:10 (from Tianjin).

The one way ticket costs 58 yuan for 2nd Class, and 70 yuan for 1st Class.

Beijing South Railway Station, which is the terminal for the high-speed train to Tianjin, and also to Shanghai in the future. But right now, as lots of construction is undergoing, if you try to walk into this building is really confusing, you will need the ferry bus to get into the station. The best way is taxi, or bus.

Inside the Beijing South Railway Station.

My first sight of the train.

Very comfortable and nice inside, and free water for the passenger. The highest speed so much as I noticed was 334 KM/H, but I can say its real high speed is more than this, and it even seems the distance is a little not long enough to testify it.

Here we are in Tianjin, Police women patroling at the Tianjin Station square.

A very interesting place called “China House”, which is about 30 minutes walk from the Station.

A view inside the House, from the ground floor to the top.

From 1920s to 1930s, part of Tianjin was occupied as foreign concession, some of the old buildings are kept, especially concentrated around 5 streets, (Machang Dao, Munan Dao, Dali Dao, Chengdu Dao, Chongqing Dao), most of these named after china’s city names.

This is better than walk around.

Our lunch place, a very fancy place, expensive. But this is not our room.

This place called “Cultural Street” is a combination of Beijing’s Liulichang and Panjiayuan market, get almost everything you need to buy. Of them, “Niren Zhang” clay sculpture impresses me the most, and in the shops it is not expensive at small pieces, 10-20 you can have a small but lovely pissing boy.

If you ever heard of Chinese Baozi (steammed Dumpling), then you should know “GouBuli” restaurant, it is just famous, and in the city you will many restaurants serve the Baozi and everyone seems to be the real one, with the help of a local friend, we locate this shop, and we were told here was the authentic restaurant.