Mitchell here.

Jīntiān de tiānqì qíngkuàng fēicháng bù hǎo! That's what I told Mr. Ren (our driver) today as I got back into our Buick GL8 after dropping the kids off at school and starting my commute to work (although since Mr. Ren drives me, does that make it our commute to work?).

I'm not sure if we've mentioned the Buick GL8 before but it's the de facto expat minivan around here. It only comes in two colors: dark blue or silver and it's what all the cool kids are driving these days. When we were looking for cars to lease back in July, we were offered three GL8s (all dark blue) to choose from. You guessed it, we went with the dark blue. I asked the rental agent if it also came in "navy" but she didn't get it. If she spoke English I bet we would've been laughing together instead of just me. Anyway, the GL8 is L.A.M.E. but it's become our home-away-from-home in the world's worst traffic. We'd take it over a taxi any day.

So back to the tiānqì (the weather); it was absolutely rotten today.

Snow? No.

Cold and windy? Not really.

Thunderstorm? Wrong.

Pollution? Yup, and lots of it. It was basically like running around in a slightly smelly cloud all day.

So back to me, Mr. Ren, our kick-ass GL8 on the open road, heading into work this morning. I wanted to take a picture with my new iPhone (thanks Jess!) to show you guys what it's like but the scenery wasn't cooperating at 80kph (I've been here five months and I still have no idea what the k stands for). I took these pictures so you'd get a feel for the pollution.

But then I turned my head and saw the sun rising over the buildings next to the Expressway. Somehow, I was able to stare directly at the sun without eye protection.

I should say, it's not normally like this and most days I have a nice view of many of the tall buildings that make up Beijing's NE skyline (that's only a fraction of Beijing's skyline. Beijing currently has 899 high-rise buildings). On really nice days I can see the mountains that circle the north and west sides of the city.

P.S. Jīntiān de tiānqì qíngkuàng fēicháng bù hǎo! means today the weather situation is very bad. Or at least that's what I think it means ...

P.P.S. Katie, before you comment, I was only joking about not knowing what the k in kph stands for. It's Chinese for miles, obviously. :)

2010-12-02 Update: Okay, Jess said no one understands my joke. I know kph = kilometers per hour. I was just being witty.