The first place we went today was the Bird’s Nest. Unfortunately, the Water Cube was closed, and I was very disappointed that we didn’t get to go inside. Even from the outside however, both buildings are incredibly impressive. From far away the steel supports of the Bird’s Nest look like little twigs, but as you get closer you can see how enormous they really are. I had heard lectures about how challenging it was to design this building and it was amazing to see it in person. I was also surprised to see how good the condition of the interior of the Bird’s Nest still is.
In the afternoon we took a company tour of Lenovo. Lenovo is a world-competing computer company, ranked number 4 behind Dell, HP and Acer. Our tour guide was very enthusiastic. He showed us the new laptops and desktops Lenovo is designing and the innovation behind many of them. We also learned a small amount of the history of Lenovo. One of the most important features Lenovo offers in its laptops is the character card which can read and write Chinese characters. Most of our tour seemed to be a pitch for Lenovo, encouraging us to look into a Lenovo computer next time we purchase one. I feel like the tour was not geared as much toward our purposes, not much of the business aspect of Lenovo was discussed. However, they did succeed in convincing me to look into Lenovo next time I buy a computer.
In the evening we went to a small cultural district in Beijing, Liulichang, which seemed to be unaffected by the Cultural Revolution. It was mainly one street that had small shops lining each side and the architecture and design looked like old Beijing’s style. Most of the shops sold either antiques or paintings and paintbrushes. I enjoyed wandering through the shops and looking at all the small trinkets they had on display. Liulichang was a nice departure from all the modernized and westernized buildings and shops that we have seen in the rest of Beijing.