KEY POINTS:
It seemed a good idea at the time, a Western-style meal in a Chinese city, but the fusion of east and west at Beijing's Wang Steakhouse was more confusion than fusion.
The pork spare rib featured a layer of fat nearly 5cm thick atop a meat cut, which
appeared to have been boiled. The waitress who offered to help when I started to slice the fat off promptly walked off with the meat, thinking it was the fat I wanted.
A few dinner fumbles aside, embracing western culture is all the rage in Beijing, as the city prepares for August's Olympic Games.
The capital city is one gigantic construction site, preparing to host the two million visitors the Games are expected to bring in. It's also fighting for solutions to the round-the-clock traffic gridlock as well as its infamous pollution.
But, despite the big kinks to be ironed out and even if you can't make it to the Olympics, this vast city is worth a visit pre- or post-Games, if only to view the venues.
At the heart of the construction, of course, lies the 100,000-seat "Bird's Nest" stadium.
Due for completion next month, it will host the opening and closing ceremonies and the Games' main track-and-field events.
And yes, it does indeed resemble a giant bird's nest, or perhaps a ball of wool after it's tangled with a kitten.
The stadium is made of 34km of bent steel, each piece no longer than 12m, constructed off-site then put together on-site like a jigsaw.
Vitally, this superstructure holds up the ceiling from the outside, giving every seat inside a view unobstructed by support pillars.
It's an awesome engineering marvel, yet around it swarm the workers, wearing little safety gear, restricted to the humble bicycle for transportation. Such contrasts are everywhere around the Olympic village, and the city.
The stadium has not been without controversy, with reports of displaced residents, worker deaths and even project engineering designer Xu Guo Bin admits he is appalled at the stadium's 3.5 billion yuan (NZ$600 million) bill.
"It's money that should be spent on education," he says as we overlook construction progress from a nearby high-rise.
Near the Nest sits another architectural extravagance - the National Aquatic Centre. Its glass mosaic exterior is designed to resemble soap bubbles - on a clear day and in the right light the walls seem to glow.
On completion each glass "pillow" will be filled with water.
In all there will be 37 new buildings, 62 new roads, four bridges and three new rail lines around Olympic park.
But if the madness of rampant construction, traffic constriction and choking pollution get too much, the city and its surrounds are also home to two wonders of the world that offer a little breathing space.
The Great Wall is about an hour's drive from Beijing, spanning 5660km from the banks of the Yalu River in the east and the Tianshan Mountains in the west.
Here at least you can walk in cleaner air over the uneven stones, polished by centuries under the feet of peasants, soldiers and tourists.
Back in Beijing, the 720,000sq m walled Forbidden City is another haven from the urban bustle.
Built in the 1400s, it is the world's largest surviving temple complex, consisting of almost 1000 buildings, most of which are covered in scaffolding for pre-Olympic polishing.
Inside, there are cities within cities, walls within walls; men, women and social strata carefully separated from each other and the outside world.
Despite the frenetic construction and never-ending change beyond the walls, in the Forbidden City at least, a part of the old China lingers.
Helen van Berkel travelled to Beijing courtesy of Air New Zealand, which begins twice-weekly direct flights to Beijing in July.
- Detours, HoS
