Apologies to those of you expecting a post about the 80s pop sensation led by Marti Pello (whatever happened to him?).
Anyway, yesterday afternoon, in the midst of some of the worst smog, I mean mist (you don’t get smog in Beijing, cough) since I have been in Beijing, I decided to spend a couple of hours at the Olympic Forest Park… it was a decision I regretted almost as soon as I arrived on site.. Within about 15 minutes, and just as I had reached the more open area of the park, the skies darkened and the rumble of thunder began to reverberate all around.. The brief highlight, as I rounded the first lake, was this Kingfisher atop a pink lotus flower as it scanned for vulnerable fish below…
I rattled off a few images before the heavens opened.. and boy did they open. Two hours later I was still sheltering under the overhang of a roof of a refreshments kiosk watching the floodwater rush by and Wishing I was Lucky. As dusk approached there was no sign of any respite, so I made a run for the metro.. Needless to say, by the time I got to the station, I was soaked to the skin…! At least the rain has cleared away much of the smog.. today is classified as “Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups” rather than yesterday’s “Hazardous” by the US Embassy’s air quality Twitter feed (@BeijingAir)….