Airport Party.

I had hastily organised CS Beijing's FIRST Airport Party at the new Terminal 3 to welcome Tien-Tien back to Beijing before she catches a connecting flight to the US of A. It was rather tricky to plan this however, as timing was crucial and a lot of elements were left to chance. She didn't even have a mobile number to reach her at, but that's spontaneity as its best.



The only information I had to work with at my disposal was that she had a 5 hour layover from 1345 - 1845 on July 24th. No flight number, and no reference to a specific terminal!

Fortunately, our group of five including myself were all open to the idea of having this Airport Party at Terminal 3 anyway regardless of weather we get to meet Tien-Tien or not. We did have a few other incentives to go as none of us have seen or been to the beautiful terminal in person. The other was for Beijing's one and only Burger King at the food court! Mmm.... Whoppers galore!

So it was on. Gab, Rita, Andy, and I took a taxi to the terminal and made a b-line to the Burger King. Yey! I can't remember the last time a fast-food chain brought so much joy to me. Perhaps it was the thought of clogged arteries and visuals of fat Americans...



After an unhealthy consumption of hamburgers, we jumped around the airport and took pictures while doing it for those awesome 'jump shots' and made quite a spectacle. Surprisingly, security were never on our backs so we continued. We did the kung-fu, the running-man, and the stupidity. After hanging around the airport for a few hours with no sign or contact from Tien-Tien, we decided to check out the Häagen-Dazs and other boutique shops clustered together throughout. That's when we came across those silly Olympic mascots on a series of billboards. We sure had fun with Jingjing and his gun.

We had decided to take the new Airport Express Line back to Dongzhimen, despite the fact that it costs 25 kaui per person. Given that we were a party of four, it would have only cost us about 75 kuai total to share a cab, but we took the subway for the experience. And seriously, what's 25 kuai in savings? It's just a little over $3 CAD. The station was very humid. Did they not think about installing AC? It was also very 'space-shippy' if you would excuse my terminology, in that it resembled something like a space-pod docking station from Star Wars of Space Odyssey: 2001. The subway/LRT line left the 'pod' at Terminal 3 towards Terminal 2, then backtracked a bit before setting it's sights to Sanyuanqiao (Three Kuai Bridge) interchange station on the newly opened Line 10 and finally to Dongzhimen interchange station on Line 2.



In closing, I had a great time at the new terminal was quite impressed with the efficient layout, east to read directions, and the open space of it all. This terminal alone is larger than London's Heathrow Airport's 5 terminals combined! Spectacular. And to think that the Chinese government had already scouted new land to build another terminal for future expansion... sheesh! Times are a'changin'.

Airport Express Line at PEK Terminal 3.

Airport Express Line platform at PEK Terminal 3.