Reporter’s Notebook: small comfort as I learn that privileged delegates suffer traffic woes, too
Day three: the third of our diary entries by ’South China Morning Post’ reporters, offering personal views on some of the behind-the-scenes activities during the annual plenums
Friday, March 6
It felt like déjà vu – all over again!
If not for the freezing wind swirling around me, I’d have thought I was on the Third Ring Road circling the centre of Beijing, just before Mid-Autumn Festival, with tens of thousands of people swarming on the main roads to reach the capital’s tourist attractions.
Day Two: early start vital if I want to be out in front and beat rivals to global headlines
As we drove back to the office from Tiananmen Square at noon yesterday, just as delegates and officials were departing for their hotels, a line of vehicles, heading towards the square along Chang An Avenue, stretched far off into the distance all the way to the Jianguomen road junction.
A number of despairing drivers stuck in the 4km-long queue got out of their cars to stand on tiptoes, to try see if the traffic lights were ever going change.
For all the latest news from China’s parliamentary sessions click here
Traffic flows on the road, which cuts across the capital, finally returned to normal in the early afternoon once delegates had arrived and were enjoying their buffet lunches, a taxi driver told me.
However, he still refused to venture onto Chang An Avenue for us, even though that was our final destination.