Beijing Encounter

My friend Saires and I arrived in Beijing on July 1st, 200. We  took a train from Suzhou and it took about 13 hours to reach Beijing. I think that was a long trip, but I didn't feel it since we were sleeping most of the time. Traveling at night is a good way to save time. We only got a one way ticket for Suzhou to Beijing so right when we got into Beijing Railway Station, we decided to book a ticket going back to Suzhou or Shanghai. I went to the ticket counter and since I couldn't speak Chinese, I was passed on to 3 different counters. The last one asked me to go to a different counter which I just came from so I refused to go back to number 22 since the lady just told me to transfer to counter 16. There was no one who could speak English which surprised me since I had a great expectation for that place since it's the capital city. I patiently waited in a long line and few minutes later I noticed that I was not moving at all. There were some guys who would just insert themselves near the counter and it really annoyed me since the counter entertained them even if they were not falling in line. More than three were successful in doing that so I didn't mind. The next thing that really got into my nerve was when a man just inserted himself right in front of me without saying anything. Of course I gave way because he was using his elbow and body to push be backward and the woman at my back pushed me forward so the man would go away. She even tried to hug me and held the woman in which was supposed to be in front of me so the man would go away. I was pushed back by the man and I was pushed forward by the woman. It hurt and I was carrying my two bags. I didn't put them down since I didn't trust the place for spitting anywhere is not an issue. I was so disappointed that I said, "Does anyone here know how to fall in line"? People were looking at me and I didn't care. I muttered few swear words in our dialects and I was really pissed off that I just left and took a picture of the line where I waited for almost an hour and got nothing.

We decided to take the bus going to our hostel so we could save and experience the real Beijing life. I felt really bad that people were not able to help us and that people don't know how to fall in line. I kept quiet for a few minutes and my friend said,"Don't worry, they're going to learn how to speak English, that's why you're here." I smiled and tried not to let the negative experience affect our nice trip.