Student name: Mr. Philip Powell
Nationality: German
Time in Global Exchange Center: 10 weeks from 23th. July

My impressions of what has changed in the last 12 months in Beijing.

The first time I came to Beijing was in August 2011. I quickly realized it was not only the biggest but also the dirtiest city I have ever been too. The masses of people amazed me and it took some time to adapt. Back then I stayed for 3 months, although 3 months is not really enough to fully explore the city I think I got quite  a good impression.

Now, August 2012, I am back in Beijing and some things have changed a lot while others have not changed at all. First of all Beijing became even bigger. More buildings, more people, more taxis, more trains...The most noticeable change though are the prices. Everything got more expensive. Most of the restaurants raised their prices by about 20%. Since I am from Europe and the Euro has dropped by about 20%  in the last 12 months means that this time I have to spend way more money on food, shelter and basically everything else as well. I also have the feeling that Beijing is a bit cleaner now. You can see a lot of people cleaning the road, parks or other public places. What hasn’t changed is the pollution. On some days the air is very bad but to be honest, I got used to it pretty quickly.